The great directors on the D’A 2020 programme include a classic of the festival, Arnaud Desplechin with his latest project Roubaix, une lumière, premiered at Cannes 2019 and his first incursion into the polar world, digging deep into the slums of a city thwart by unemployment and poverty. This is the Spanish premiere of a movie that won a César for Best Actor for its star, Roschdy Zem, who is joined in this film by two stars of French cinema, Léa Seydoux and Sara Forestier. Another prominent figure of contemporary cinema is Werner Herzog with his documentary Nomad: In the Footsteps of Bruce Chatwin, a piercing tribute to his friend Chatwin, the writer and adventurer who died of Aids in 1989, and which showcases a director who is perpetually curious about the mysteries of the world. Cult Japanese director Kiyoshi Kurosawa closed the last Locarno festival with a film that is now coming to D’A 2020, the delightful To the Ends of the Earth, starring Japanese pop icon Atsuko Maeda in the role of a travel reporter dealing with culture shock in Uzbekistan. Chinese director Lou Ye (winner of the Tiger award at Rotterdam 2000 for Suzhou River) presents Saturday Fiction, a spy drama set during the Japanese occupation of China starring the great Gong Li (2046, Adiós a mi concubina), winner of Best Director at Gijón 2019.